Caroline Schaumann, professor of German Studies at Emory University and an experienced rock and mountain climber, offers an important book on the transatlantic history of mountaineering in the long nineteenth history. In recent decades, the field of mountaineering history has been enriched by investigations of its cultural, political, and economic contexts. Transition to modernity, nation building and imperialism, gender roles and masculinity, have been much-discussed topics of research. Schaumann wants to expand the field and complicate its frameworks through nuanced inquiries into individual mountain climbers. “Deriving from my approach as a literary scholar, my work comprises analyses of primary texts to illuminate the ambiguities and complexities of early mountain climbing. It focuses especially on the complex interplay of body and mind that can become lost in overarching historical arguments” (14).

The book is structured in three parts and deals with eleven mountaineers, most of them involved in scientific exploration: “From Europe to the Americas” (Alexander von Humboldt); “Alpine Adventures” (Horace-Bénédict de Saussure, James David Forbes, Louis Agassiz, Albert Smith, Alfred Wills, John Tyndall, Edward Whymper, Leslie Stephen); and “Exploring the American West” (Clarence King, John Muir). These prominent personalities are examined here “from cradle to death bed,” with numerous aspects of their biographies and writings elucidated. An interesting technique of the book is the combination and contrasting of two life courses. The glacier aficionados Forbes and Agassiz, for example, are presented in a pas de deux, beginning in harmony and ending in bitterness. In the introduction and in the epilogue, Schaumann posits her narrative in an elaborate, engaged way within current environmental concerns: “In the Anthropocene, when mountain glaciers are shrinking by the year, when, as part of the great acceleration of a heating planet, the human imprint is destroying the earth as we know it, and when even science and the very facts of environmental destruction are under threat, we need reminders of mountain pleasures, wonder, and passion more than ever” (23).

I have my reservations about some aspects of the book. The author seems to be in need of an update in Alpine history, for example, with regard to the framing of dragon tales, the emergence of the Swiss Confederation, the not-so-organized first Alpine tour of Thomas Cook, and Humboldt's “more extensive explorations in the Alps” after his American journey (47)—which, as far as I know, never happened; he only crossed the Alps to get to Italy in 1805 and 1822. Schaumann wants to go beyond the British imperial frame, but her selection of protagonists for the “Alpine Adventures” section follows the canon quite closely, thereby reinforcing the illusion that “the English made the Alps” (to paraphrase a telling book title). If anything, the Alps in the nineteenth century were a truly cosmopolitan place, with people flocking in from as far as Russia and America. The populous neighboring (and partially alpine) states of France, Germany, Austria-Hungary, Italy—as well as the small but busy Swiss Confederation—delivered the large majority of travelers and mountaineers, including those who achieved many first ascents. Moreover, I am not convinced by the presentation of Humboldt as a model of mountaineering. The fascinating German naturalist is a good choice to frame the book, but it seems to me that his influence on followers was more in his role as famous all-round naturalist and generous patron of scientific research. Against the multitude of Humboldt names that have been given to anything from a human settlement to an ocean current, the comparatively few “Humboldt Peaks” can easily be overlooked.

That is not to say that mountains played a negligible role in his biography. In accordance with the author, I think that they mattered a lot in his lifelong intense research and writing. Schaumann's is the comprehensive, detailed report and analysis of Humboldt's mountain climbs on his South American journey in English. In the expanding research about him, this point has long remained a desideratum not least because his textual and pictorial legacy is complex and requires multilingual research. Therefore, Humboldt as mountaineer—Schaumann justly says (49)—remained underpublicized, which reinforces the view that other aspects of the man loomed larger in the complex processes of worldwide reception and reworking of his feats. People had fewer opportunities to see him in that role.

On the whole, in my opinion, Peak Pursuits is a great book. I am glad that I had the chance to read it and warmly recommend it to specialists and for general readership. Schaumann has an elegant, enjoyable flow in her writing—perhaps paralleling her flow in climbing? In any case, she has much to say about the material, physical, and corporeal dimensions of mountaineering history, the relations among body, mind, mountain, and wilderness. Both in writing and in selecting the thirty-five illustrations, the book is crafted with care. With the structure of her study, Schaumann captures and substantiates the transatlantic transfer of the perception of mountains from Europe to the United States particularly well. The study is not streamlined to an overarching (artificial) thesis, and thus allows for interesting surprises. I fully agree with the author when she speaks of the advantage of primary texts for illuminating the ambiguities and complexities of early mountain climbing. Intimate relations in male mountaineering, for example, are handled with openness and subtlety. A balanced view of persons and their fortunes and failures sets an example for others who follow this excellent mountain guide.